Pesticide Use Tied To Lower IQ In Children

Who could have guessed that drenching our food and homes in brain-ravaging toxins would have dire consequences? Wired Science reports that pesticides have been strongly linked to decreased memory and a seven-point drop in IQ in exposed children:

Children exposed in the womb to substantial levels of neurotoxic pesticides have somewhat lower IQs by the time they enter school than do kids with virtually no exposure. A trio of studies screened women for compounds in blood or urine that mark exposure to organophosphate pesticides such as chlorpyrifos, diazinon and malathion.

These bug killers, which can cross the human placenta, work by inhibiting brain-signaling compounds. Although the pesticides’ residential use was phased out in 2000, spraying on farm fields remains legal.

The three new studies began in the late 1990s and followed children through age 7. Pesticide exposures stem from farm work in more than 300 low-income Mexican-American families in California, researchers from the University of California at Berkeley and their colleagues report. In two comparably sized New York City populations, exposures likely trace to bug spraying of homes or eating treated produce.

Completely unsurprising, considering the midcentury Poliomyelitis ‘epidemic’ was largely the result of indiscriminate and heavy use of DDT, BHC, LA, CA, and other persistent neurotoxic pesticides on food crops and dairy cows. I’d be suspicious if the study DIDN’T find such a connection, considering these poisons work by being neurotoxic to insects.

JoiquimCouteau

Completely unsurprising, considering the midcentury Poliomyelitis ‘epidemic’ was largely the result of indiscriminate and heavy use of DDT, BHC, LA, CA, and other persistent neurotoxic pesticides on food crops and dairy cows. I’d be suspicious if the study DIDN’T find such a connection, considering these poisons work by being neurotoxic to insects.

justagirl

LOL! still laughing at that. good one.

wayne e

I read the headline as “lowering the IQ of chickens”! I guess I need to eat more organic food!

wayne e

I read the headline as “lowering the IQ of chickens”! I guess I need to eat more organic food!

Ajsdfhadsd

Lol and when it’s in this context, where are all the idiots saying IQ counts for absolutely nothing?

Ajsdfhadsd

Lol and when it’s in this context, where are all the idiots saying IQ counts for absolutely nothing?

Andrew

How do we know it’s not the prevalence of low I.Q.s causing the use of pesticides?

Andrew

How do we know it’s not the prevalence of low I.Q.s causing the use of pesticides?